About snow

When it’s cold and it’s snowing, use it to your advantage to teach your pupils all about snow. Read on to find out how you can make snow days, fun days when in school.

In Key Stage 2 Science, children do lots of work on changing states of matter. Why not add some variety to science lessons and investigate the properties of snow. I mean, it’s made from water, but it’s not the same as ice, and it definitely doesn’t look anything like a liquid… So what is it?

Snow begins with snow crystals. They form when the cloud temperature is at freezing point, or below. Clouds are full of moisture and as the water vapour condenses, ice crystals form on dust particles in the air.

As the snow crystals fall, they come into contact with warmer air and melt slightly. They bond together creating snowflakes. Colder air produces small snowflakes and warmer air produces large snowflakes.

There is a high percentage of air trapped inside the snow crystals. Fresh snow can contain up to 95% air. The water content of snow is variable. On average 25 cm of snow is equivalent to 2.5 cm of water.

You may have wondered why snow is white? It is white because very little light is absorbs and most of the light is reflected by the smooth surfaces of the snow crystals. Visible light is white, so snow also appears white.

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One thought on “About snow”

Interesting article, Peppi. I didn’t know why there were small and large snowflakes, or even that there were. We never get to see snow where I live. 🙂
I really enjoyed your video. I was surprised at how much of the earth is covered by snow at any one time.